When Alexander the Great led the great conquest of the Old World he never ceased his search for knowledge and the pleasure of learning. Taught by Aristotle, a great philosopher, Alexander expanded his intellectual frontiers of philosophy and culture with every new victory. He recognized that even during the periods of downtime in his empire, there was much to learn. Similarly, many schools require their students to participate in summer assignments built to prepare their minds for the upcoming year. However, while some advocate for teacher designed summer programs, schools would provide summer assignments that benefit the students more if the assignments were to be designed by students. Student designed assignments would provide future classes with the necessary skills they need in a manner that emphasizes the experience of the student in the class rather than teaching the content in a non-classroom setting. Student designed assignments would teach the style of the class, expose the rigor of the content, and test the readiness of the students before they enter the door.

No two classes are taught the exact same. When teachers standardize the content of their summer assignments between other teachers and themselves, they lose the ability to expect their students to perform at the specific standards of the teacher and present information in a style at which they deem is appropriate. Having students design the summer assignments would allow future students to realize what stylistic choices the class may require and how the day to day of the class operates. A teacher's reality of a class that they teach differs greatly from that of the student's. Students would be able to suggest to future students helpful tips that would help them from day one of the class such as the teacher liking when students turn in assignments at a certain font size or type or the teacher prefers active over passive voice when writing. Additionally, student designed assignments would give future students the opportunity to see what the class is really like. A teacher may overlook the fact that their class etiquette and canon is to start with a warm up, then work through problems, and finally teach new material. Students who have grown accustomed to a certain style of classroom procedure would have the opportunity to give future students the appropriate expectations of what class is really like prior to the start of school.

Student designed assignments would educate future students as to what kind of work ethic is needed for such a class. The teacher may have one perception of how rigorous a class is. However, the students' overall concensus as to what the work load is would be more congruent with how future classes would perceive it. The teacher may assume that the work load distributed throughout the year is extremely light and requires very little effort. As a result, the summer assignment may inaccurately portray the course work. A student with the experience of working through the class would have a keener understanding of what to expect from the class in terms of rigor and would hopefully reflect their experiences in the assignment.

Lastly, student designed assignments would test the capabilities of the student more accurately. When a teacher designs a summer assignment. The content is focused on learning two weeks worth of course related information prior to attending school. Student designed assignments would, in turn, test the intellectual cognition of future students. This would weed out students who may learn come October or November that they do not have the necessary skills to succeed in the class and it is not worth their efforts to continue. Student designed reports would test the readiness of the future students. Furthermore, many AP and advanced classes require students to understand and know how to use the jargon of the classroom. Such vernacular includes contextualization, thesis statement, historical analysis, free-response question, and document based question. Prior to their first day in an AP class, students are widely unfamiliar with the language and testing system of their class and therefore struggle with the tests and essays in practice. Student designed reports would expose future students to this material as well as test the individual's ability to perform at a satisfactory level in the class.

While some teacher designed assignments benefit the students by learning factual information that will benefit them over the first two weeks of school, student designed reports would enable teachers and students to have a better academic relationship over the course of the entire school year. By exposing the students to the style, rigor, and expectations of the class, students will know what they are getting themselves into far better than if they were to read and annotate a book that is relevant for the better half of a month. Students would also give future students the ability to practice their skills if they so choose to do so; preparing future students for the essay styles of rhetorical analysis, document based questions, and free response questions that are synonymous with the AP brand. Because of these reasons, teacher designed assignments holds a dim candle to the flaming torch of student designed assignments that would benefit future classes throughout the entire year.